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Kenya

Orengo boasts progress towards Land Commission

NAIROBI, Kenya, May 19 – The Ministry of Lands says it has prepared a first draft Bill aimed at revising and consolidating existing laws governing all public and private land.

Lands Minister James Orengo said on Tuesday that the policy aims to operationalise the National Land Commission (NLC) which will deal with all matters concerning land acquisition and use.

He pointed out that the Ministry has made tremendous strides in the implementation of reforms provided by the Constitution as outlined in the National Land Policy.

“For the National Land Commission to fully function there is need to revise, consolidate and rationalise existing land laws as provided in Article 68 of the new Constitution,” he said.

The Constitution proposes NLC to be an oversight body and is expected to be steered by a Chairman and run by a Director General, under whom five directorates fall.

These are Administration, Lands, Spatial Planning, Geo-Spatial Planning and Supervisor of County Boards.

Among the functions proposed for NLC include holding titles to public land on behalf of the State, assessing tax on land and premiums on immovable property, inspectorate and audit services, and ensuring compliance with spatial development plans.

NLC is also expected to support County Governments and deal with innovations such as e-conveyancing, research and development, and market support. 

New institutions proposed under the NLC are County Land Boards, Community Land Boards, a Land Trust Fund and Land Tribunals.

At County level, the Commission is expected to deal with compliance with Spatial Development Plans, hold titles to public land on behalf of the State and develop and manage a Land Information Management System (LIMS).

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Other functions include settlement and adjudication and group ranches administration.

Functions proposed for the Ministry include co-ordination of international affairs, namely conventions, protocols and international boundaries.

Speaking during a stakeholders’ forum, Mr Orengo also announced plans to digitise land records at the ministry.

“The development of a National Land Information Management System that is aimed at converting massive paper records to digital form for easy access and retrieval of information and improvement of service delivery,” he said.

“To this end, the ministry has commenced safeguarding and scanning of records at Nairobi, Mombasa and Nakuru Land registries.”

Follow us on TWITTER @CapitalFM_Kenya and the author at https://twitter.com/ndonggor
 

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